This only secured the PAP one additional seat in parliament, since extreme malapportionment and gerrymandering had already translated its 60 per cent share of the votes, absurdly, into over 93 per cent of all seats. But it was still a result sure to make Singapore’s rulers bask in the soothing glow of self-satisfaction.
They would have more reason to gloat if they won the election democratically. Singapore may have competitive elections, but they are still authoritarian elections. By definition, democracy requires a reasonably level playing field between the government and the opposition. Singapore’s competitive terrain is so farcically uneven that it looks more like a hunting ground than a field of play. State resources flow freely and unapologetically to the PAP’s partisan benefit. The media is closely monitored and bridled. The election commission lacks independence (hence the gerrymandering). Assembly is tightly curtailed. Dissidents reasonably fear various legal and administrative punishments. And so do voters, who face potential collective punishment for their districts if they swing toward the opposition.
This isn’t to say the PAP couldn’t win democratic elections. Of course it could, and this is precisely the point. Friday’s election broadly captured the will of the Singaporean people. The majority wants the PAP to rule. And why shouldn’t they? Singapore has become one of the wealthiest societies on earth while the PAP has been in power. Inequality is rising steeply, but where isn’t it? The PAP took their 2011 setback to heart, responding to citizen complaints with new spending programs (which are popular) and new limits on immigration (which is not). This was a genuine electoral landslide; it just wasn’t a democratic one.
So why does the PAP insist on maintaining authoritarian controls? We tend to assume that governments that maintain authoritarian controls do so to stay in power. But that argument simply doesn’t wash in the Singaporean context. The PAP is not remaining authoritarian by popular demand, although its electoral success surely gives it more leeway to stay authoritarian. And it is not remaining authoritarian because civil society is weak, as if that somehow made a genuine political opening impossible. The PAP remains authoritarian because it wants to.
These latest election results might well lead the PAP to conclude that its combination of open-handed spending and strong-armed social control remains an invincible one. But its popularity comes from how much it does for Singapore’s people, not from how much it intimidates them. If the PAP is a ‘philanthropic ogre’, as poet Octavio Paz once dubbed Mexico’s ruling party, why not just preserve the philanthropy and ditch the ogre routine?
There is ample precedent for doing so. As Joseph Wong and I have argued, most of Asia’s democracies have come about because authoritarian rulers wanted to keep ruling without staying authoritarian. It started in the late 1940s in Japan, where conservative politicians stuck with democracy, even when Cold War considerations made the United States stop caring much about it, because it delivered them landslide victories. Taiwan followed suit by the 1980s, and the island remains wealthy, stable and democratic to this day. South Korea democratised at nearly the same historical moment. Its old ruling party currently holds power some 30 years later, just as the old Kuomintang does in Taiwan.
Democracies don’t only come about when societies topple dictatorships. They can and do come about when authoritarian regimes realise that people support them for their economic policies and performance, not for their authoritarianism. The PAP could become a democratic dominant party as surely as — indeed even more surely than — its predecessors in Japan, Taiwan and South Korea. 2015 may have been one of the PAP’s most successful authoritarian elections; but it could also be Singapore’s final authoritarian election, if the PAP would simply decide to make it so.
When pondering this ‘democracy-through-strength’ scenario, PAP leaders might consider the lessons of its downward-spiralling neighbour, Malaysia. Barely a decade ago, Malaysia’s ruling party had its own turn for a good electoral gloat. Back in 2004, Malaysia’s Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition recovered from its stiff 1999 setback by hauling in its largest parliamentary seat share ever, at over 90 per cent. The key lesson learned was that any and all pressures and imperatives for democratic reform had been snuffed out for good.
How wrong they were. The 1999 electoral setback wasn’t the exception; the 2004 landslide was. Coming in the wake of Mahathir Mohamad’s long-awaited retirement, Malaysia’s 2004 election gave a mandate to his successor to pursue deeper reforms. That opportunity was squandered, and the BN has watched its support continuously haemorrhage, especially among young urbanites. The 2008 and 2013 elections saw the BN shrivel from a behemoth with over 90 per cent of all seats to one with less than 50 per cent of all votes. Malaysia’s ruling party now finds itself in a situation where, short of democratic reform, it has no tools left to regain the support of the lion’s share of its most dynamic population.
Singapore’s slide in that direction is nowhere near as advanced. But why not stop it before it even really gets started? The PAP has a golden opportunity to be in power for yet another 50 years. If only it would decide to make the 2015 election Singapore’s final authoritarian election.
Dan Slater is associate professor in political science at the University of Chicago. His recent EAF piece on Malaysia’s current political crisis can be found here. His twitter account is @SlaterPolitics.
It’s disingenuous and misleading to claim that the PAP’s “share of the national vote slumped from over 75 per cent in 2001 to barely 60 per cent in 2011.” Why didn’t Dan Slater use the 1991 election’s 61.0per cent as the baseline to compare with 2011’s 60.1per cent? The truth is that the PAP’s share of the vote has vacillated within a positive band over most of the 14 consecutive elections won by the PAP: 1959 (54per cent), 1963 (47per cent), 1968 (87per cent), 1972 (70per cent), 1976 (74per cent), 1980 (77per cent), 1984 (65per cent), 1988 (63per cent), 1991 (61per cent), 1997 (65per cent), 2001 (75per cent), 2006 (67per cent), 2011 (60per cent), 2015 (70per cent).
The PAP’s performance has been impressive. In comparison, the last time a British political party managed to crack 60per cent of the popular vote was 147 years ago — when Gladstone’s Liberals achieved 61per cent in 1868!
What is really farcical is that most so-called western ‘democracies’ are led by ruling parties or leaders that do not have the mandate of the majority of the electorate. In the US: Obama won the 2012 U.S. presidential elections with only 51.1per cent of the vote on 58.2per cent voter turnout – in other words, the USA is being ‘ruled’ by a leader who has the mandate of only 29.7per cent of all eligible voters! In the United Kingdom: in 2015, Cameron’s Conservatives won only 36.9per cent of the vote on 66.1per cent voter turnout – and yet controls parliament with 330 (51per cent) out of the 650 seats. In other words, Britain is being ruled by a party that has the mandate of only 24per cent of all eligible voters! In Canada: in the 2011 Canadian elections, the leading Conservative party won only 39.62per cent of the popular vote yet won 53.9per cent of all seats (on a 61.1per cent turnout) – in other words, the Canadian government is run by the party that was elected by only 24.2per cent of total voters.
In comparison, the PAP won 70per cent of the popular vote on 93.56per cent voter turnout – and also won 83 (93per cent) out of the 89 seats. Singapore is being led by a party that has the mandate of 65per cent of all eligible voters.
Google and watch “gerrymandering snagfilms” to learn about gerrymandering in the U.S. Gerrymandering is a common practice in ‘western democracies’ because the leading political party typical gets less than 50per cent of the popular vote so their ability to control parliament and get to power depends on which voting districts contain their supporters.
In Singapore’s case, gerrymandering is not needed for the PAP to retain a majority in parliament — given that the PAP consistently wins at least 60per cent of the popular vote (70per cent in this election) on a high voter turnout.
It would appear Tony has either not read Slater’s posting, or has chosen to endorse its message with his examples.
That 70% of the vote results in the PAP winning 93% of the seats demonstrates the electoral model is tilted. The use of GRCs and the method for deciding electoral boundaries are used to maintain the PAP status quo.
He should also remember the dictatorship in North Korea is propped up by the same sort of claim of high voter turnout and result.
Trying to argue the Singapore election results means Singapore is somehow more of a democracy than Canada further strengthens the thrust of this post: If the PAP – and its supporters – believe they have the right policies, and would have the popular support of the voters, why don’t they lower the level of authoritarianism, depoliticize the civil service, and open up the media to genuine freedom of opinion?
Many of the discussions I have with Singaporeans about this come back to the belief that paternalistic control is in the best interests of the country. This was the same argument used in South Africa to prop up apartheid. Of course, those arguing Singaporeans need to be told what to think are inevitably talking about ‘other Singaporeans’ rather than themselves.
The lack of truly democratic structures and a strong opposition is, I believe, weakening Singapore in the medium to long term. The arguments that Singapore needed a firm hand of government to develop may have had credence, but given Singapore’s economic strength can no longer be sufficient argument for what is there today.
Singapore is one of the most successful societies in the world. Why change what works extremely well? Even worse, why risk adopting the problems of American society (and many other western so-called democracies)? Singapore does not mindlessly mimic approaches that do not work well for American society, yet the Southeast Asian city-state in some ways bears more resemblance to greatest American and European business organizations. Google “Singapore Challenges the Idea that Democracy is the Best Form of Governance” by Graham Allison.
It’s disingenuous to pretend that I “endorsed (Slater’s) message with (my) examples.” Obviously my examples from the U.K. and Canada debunked your dubious conclusion that “That 70 percent of the vote results in the PAP winning 93 percent of the seats demonstrates the electoral model is tilted.” Basic math shows that the PAP actually won, proportionally, a slightly lower percentage of seats from its share of votes than what happened in the 2015 U.K. elections (36.9 percent of the vote results in the Conservative Party winning 51 percent of all seats) and in the 2011 Canadian elections (39.62 percent of the vote results in the Conservative Party winning 53.9 percent of all seats).
Slater downplays the outcome of Singapore’s 2015 general elections: “This only secured the PAP one additional seat in parliament”. Slater omits to tell us that the opposition Workers’ Party (WP) leaders Low Thia Khiang and Sylvia Lim nearly lost their seats. Furthermore, the PAP’s absolute size of the vote and relative share of the vote both increased – while the opposition’s size and share of the vote decreased — in all 7 seats won by the opposition in the 2011 general election and 2013 by-election. In addition to losing a seat, all 9 opposition parties contesting the election saw a drop in their percentage of votes.
Slater’s additional omissions contradict his dubious suggestion that the PAP won “93 per cent of all seats” due to “extreme malapportionment and gerrymandering.” Slater’s most glaring omissions are the following: First, the WP’s share of the national vote slumped from over 16.7 percent in 1988 (when it failed to win any seat) to 12.48 percent in 2015 (when it won 6 seats). In other words, the WP won 7 percent of all seats in 2015 (from 0 seats in 1988) despite losing 25 percent of its share of the national vote since 1988! Second, the PAP won back only 14 percent of the opposition seats in 2015 (only 1 of the 7 seats held by the opposition before the election), despite improving its share of the national vote by 16 percent (from 60 percent in 2011 to 70 percent in 2015). Third, the PAP won 93 percent of all seats in the 2011 elections and again in the 2015 elections, despite improving its share of the national vote by 16 percent. Common sense tells us that — if the PAP had really used malapportionment and gerrymandering as a tactic to win more seats – then the PAP should have easily won 95 to 100 percent of all seats and wiped out the opposition. The 2015 election results are not the expected effect of gerrymandering.
Regardless, the lack of gerrymander effect did not stop Slater from jumping to conclusions to claim an imagined causal link: “the election commission lacks independence (hence the gerrymandering).”
Slater disparages Singapore’s elections as undemocratic, “authoritarian elections.” He even sensationally portrays the PAP as the predator in its happy hunting ground! He claims the playing field is farcically unfair and uneven due to extreme malapportionment, extreme gerrymandering, tightly curtailed freedom of assembly, punishment of dissidents, collective punishment of voters in opposition districts, partisan use of state resources, curbs on media freedom. Analyzing these issues is for another discussion altogether, though Wolfgang Sachsenroeder has brought up several valid points.
Slater made sensational allegations. But he failed to show how his allegations specifically explain the 2015 election results in the opposition’s three electoral districts below (comprising 7 seats).
– Aljunied group seats: In 2011 elections, the WP (54.72) had beaten the PAP (45.28). Votes for the PAP increased from 59,829 in 2011 to 67,317 in 2015. In the 2015 elections, the WP (50.95 percent) barely held on to its group of 5 seats here by a margin of less than one percentage point over the PAP (49.05). Votes for the WP decreased from 72,289 to 69,929.
– Punggol East single seat: In the 2013 by-election, the WP (54.5) won this seat from the PAP (43.7) despite a four-party fight which included two other opposition parties (1.8). In the 2015 elections, the Workers Party (48.24 percent) lost this seat to the PAP (51.76) in a two-party fight. Votes for the PAP increased from 12,875 in 2013 to 16,957 in 2015. Votes for the WP decreased from 16,045 to 15,801.
– Hougang single seat: In the 2011 election, the WP (64.8 per cent) beat the PAP (35.2). In the 2015 elections, the Workers Party (57.69) beat the PAP (42.31). Votes for the PAP increased from 8,065 to 9,543. Votes for the WP decreased from 14,850 to 13,012.
Nor does Slater discuss why these alleged PAP tactics failed to work in other elections such as in 1988 (Lee Kuan Yew’s PAP had 63% share of vote), 1991 (61%) or 2011 (60%).
Singapore’s voters/electorate are among the best educated and smartest in the world. They are more engaged in the voting process and more rational in voting. It is ludicrous to compare Singapore’s voter turnout and secret ballot with what happens in “the dictatorship in North Korea” or what happened during Apartheid in South Africa.
Some key reasons for the low voter turnout in North America are voter apathy, poor candidates and sense of hopelessness that elections would change their lives. Google “The alarming decline in voter turnout” in Globe and Mail and and also “Low voter turnout produces bad government. Here’s why” in National Post.
Ironically, most of Slater’s arguments about “authoritarian elections” in Singapore can also be applied to the U.S.A., Canada, the U.K and most other western so-called democracies. This is partly evident when we search Google for the following articles: “gerrymandering snagfilms” by snag films; “America’s Electoral Farce” by Chris Hedges; “Elections Run by Same Guys Who Sell Toothpaste” by Noam Chomsky; “Unfree Elections – The Corporate Media, UK General Election And Predictable Outcomes” in Media Lens; “General Election 2015: Tories hit hard with YouTube attack ads” in the London Telegraph; “The Myth of the Free Press” by Chris Hedges; “Democracy in America Is a Useful Fiction” by Chris Hedges; “Study shows USA is an oligarchy, not a democracy” in BBC; “Inverted Totalitarianism” by Sheldon Wolin; “The U.S. behaves nothing like a democracy” by Noam Chomsky; “Inverted Totalitarianism as a – Threat to Democracy” by Chris Hedges and Sheldon Wolin. These references were deleted from my original post – this censorship is questionable given Slater’s argument about the “bridled” Singapore media and need to have “genuine freedom of opinion”.
Having discussions with a few Singaporeans is unlikely to turn any short-term visitor to Singapore into an expert on Singapore politics (Google: “Minister: ‘Noisy minority’ may lose it like in Singapore GE”). On the other hand, I’ve lived approximately half my life in Singapore (including 95 percent of Lee Kuan Yew’s tenure as Singapore’s leader) and half in North America. I have a unique perspective and experience to compare Singapore’s elections with over a quarter century of watching federal elections in the U.S. and Canada. Singapore’s approach isn’t perfect but, all things considered, it is somewhat superior as it already is. It’s irrational to regress.
Dan Slater’s assessment of the Singapore election misses mention of several changes in the political landscape. Malapportionment is the essence of first-past-the-post electoral systems and neither Britain nor Singapore are abolishing it.
“Dissidents reasonably fear various legal and administrative punishments.”? No, Lee Kuan Yew is dead and the old fear factor has vanished.
“The media is closely monitored and bridled”? No, the coverage of opposition rallies, election platforms, candidates and their arguments was more open and comprehensive than ever before. And the blogosphere projected the opposition so strongly that some PAP ministers had doubts whether they could win their own constituencies.
Dan Slater does not say anything about the weaknesses of the splintered opposition scene. Among the eight parties contesting only the Workers’Party narrowly retained its strongholds with six seats and will get three more for their best losers with restricted voting rights.
Workers’Party and Singapore Democratic Party pulled huge crowds in their many rallies but did not convince the silent majority including young and first time voters.
Attacking the dominant PAP with arguments from cost of living and health care to train breakdowns and immigration was obviously not sufficient to convince potential opposition voters. The huge majority for the PAP signals risk aversion and trust in the team of PM Lee and his popularity without hubris.
There are certainly few voters who would believe disappointed opposition leaders that the election was undemocratic or reminiscent of North Korea…
In response to Wolfgang,
“Dissidents reasonably fear various legal and administrative punishments.”? No, Lee Kuan Yew is dead and the old fear factor has vanished.
Mr. Lee Kuan Yew is dead but it takes years to see the change from the system that PAP architected. The old fear factor will not vanished as the older generation will remember what they went through. Ask any singaporeans that lived through that era, nobody can confidently tell you that they don’t fear the ruling party.
“The media is closely monitored and bridled”?
Local media is largely biased towards the ruling party. If a party practises authoritarian rule, will they forget to control media? Watch the differences in information provided by the mainstream media and the actual fact.
The rest of the responses are results of open-handed spending and strong-armed social control.
The fear factor in Singapore is overblown and bandied as an excuse by critics and the opposition. I lived though Lee Kuan Yew’s tenure as chief minister and prime minister: there was never an oppressive, pervasive fear factor, though there was strict and sometimes over-zealous adherence to the rule of law. Sure Singapore had a few famous incidents but then so did the U.S. and most western countries.
When I was an elections officer in one of the polling stations during the 1980s, I voted against a leading PAP candidate (whom I actually preferred) as a ‘pressure vote’ in good times to prevent government from getting complacent and taking the population for granted. I did not fear any repercussions as most people knew the vote was secret (despite critics’ attempts to tarnish the voting process).
The mainstream media in the U.S. is biased and controlled. As Noam Chomsky noted: “Propaganda is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state.” Google “The Myth of the Free Press” by Chris Hedges, a former New York Times bureau chief. I also recommend Prof. Noam Chomsky’s book “Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies”
From what I’ve observed, the media is being supervised even more closely by the government post-2011: attempt to regulate the Internet by introducing a licensing regime for alternative online news sites, suing bloggers such as Alex Au, propaganda messages advertising the Pioneer Generation Package inserted into Channel 8 drama serials, frequent appearances by ministers on television talk shows, just to name a few examples. In the run-up to the election, national television was carpet-bombed by propaganda ads.
And the social media sphere is not as anti-PAP as you might imagine. Just take a look at Lee Hsien Loong’s Facebook page.
“And the social media sphere is not as anti-PAP as you might imagine. Just take a look at Lee Hsien Loong’s Facebook page”
So the PM’s page is an accurate reflection of social media anti-PAP sentiments in Singapore?
Slater cannot accept that Singapore does not practice perfect democracy because he doesn’t want to. Same as saying PAP doesn’t want to practice full democracy because they don’t want to. “(PAP) They would have more reason to gloat if they won the election democratically.” I don’t think trying to achieve a complete state of democracy is the true objective of politics in any country nor is the objective for the political party to gloat. That is totally missing the point and that is probably the objective of theoretical academics. At the heart of it all are the lives and livelihoods of people who live in that country; jobs, security, safety, stability, healthcare and measured freedom that does not condone lawlessness. Do we want to go down the road the Americans have done? No! And EU countries like Greece and Spain? No! Neither do we want to go down the road for military dictators like North Korea. The mix of political practice in Singapore has worked and if shown to be successful, will and may prove to be its own brand of successful politics.
Mediocre column. Singapore runs on Meritocracy whereas Malaysia runs on ethnic mobilization and power.
Further, the Chinese majority in Singapore has 70% lower fertility rate than Malay minority, whereas in Malaysia, the Malay majority has 70% higher fertility rate than Chinese minority.
Malaysia is becoming more and more Malay, less and less Chinese, which means politics in a future Malaysia will be less ethnic identity based and more economics based.
Singapore is importing more Chinese from Malaysia, to maintain its Chinese majority. 35% of all immigration to Singapore is from Malaysia, a sizable % from a country of 30million compared to overpopulated giants, China and India.